India’s private equity last year was worth only half of WhatsApp

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India’s fast-growing e-commerce businesses helped the country attract 50% more private-equity investment in 2014 compared with the year before.

But for all the hype, total PE investment in India last year was only about $10.9 billion—still shy of the $14.5 billion invested in 2007, and just a little more than half of what Facebook paid in 2014 to acquire WhatsApp.

Just two online shopping companies—Flipkart and Snapdeal—together brought in about $3 billion in PE investments last year. Online service firms accounted for more than 37% of all PE investments in 2014.